Innehållsförteckning för March 1960 från Hot Rod

“That’s my office there in the picture, you might say. I’m a conservation officer, and I spend most of my time patrolling my beat—four hundred square miles of wilderness, with darned few miles of road in it. Takes a real man-sized car to haul me and my equipment around. I talked it over with a Chevrolet dealer a while back, and when he pulled out that tremendous list of options—well, here’s what I’m driving now: “A Nomad station wagon, as you can see. Four doors, six passengers, plenty of space for gear—a beauty, isn’t she? Under the hood, there’s that 230-horse Super Turbo-Fire V8*. Lots of pep and it hasn’t faltered yet. I teamed it with the standard three-speed transmission. You just don’t find a tougher pair than that, or…

Wendover, Utah: Here on the blistering Salt Flats at the eleventh annual Bonneville National Speed Trials, the new San Chez Special established two sizzling records: 217.26 mph in Class B Competition, and 204.31 mph in Class B Coupe and Sedan. Like most other Bonneville contestants, the crew of the San Chez depended on Pennzoil Z-7 to protect their expensive racing engines. Driving conditions at Bonneville are the toughest any oil can meet. Yet this pure Pennsylvania oil passed every grueling test, kept engine parts clean and free-moving all the time—in high-powered engines roaring through midday desert heat… cooling through chilly desert nights. Treat your engine to Pennzoil Z-7, choice of drivers who demand peak engine condition all the time. Ask for Pennzoil by name, wherever you go … whatever you…

Plymouth’s i960 offering for the American public to look over and perhaps choose to buy is a vastly different automobile than it was in 1959. The ’60 models do not really appear to have been changed much when first viewed on the road; you have to get up close to this car, inspect it carefully, sit in it and drive it before you are convinced that it is a different automobile. The most important change made was a switch from separate frame and body to unitized construction. This is not a new idea for Chrysler; they tried it with their Airflow models back in the mid-’thirties but those cars were, according to experts, too far advanced for their time and didn’t sell too well. In more recent years. Hudson and…

With the three largest automobile manufacturers in this country now producing compact models, car enthusiasts suddenly find that there are three all-new small displacement engines available for them to play with. It is only natural that pieces of speed equipment be manufactured to fit these new engines and at this early date, we have already picked up information on three well known names in the speed field who are concentrating plenty of effort on the Falcon engine. The first is Edelbrock Equipment Company of Los Angeles; the second is Holman & Moody of Charlotte, North Carolina, famous for their Competition-Proven engines in NASCAR stock and modified races; the third is Bill Stroppe and Associates of Long Beach, California, who were responsible for Lincoln and Mercury successes while the factories were…

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The Hot Sparks hot rod club is a “solid citizen” of the town of Putnam, Con-necticut, incorporated with the state, and a Charter Member of the National Hot Rod Association. Their bootstrap operation from total obscurity to top-flight organization within a two-year period is not only commendable in itself but can serve as a strong pattern for other young auto enthusiasts to follow in their steps. Here’s their story. Inspired by cold winter nights of meeting in a farmyard cow shed, the Sparks hit upon a promotional idea that was eventually to springboard the club into its present enviable status. The operation hinged on a hi-fi set owned by one of the members. With this set, a stack of donated records, and a twelve-dollar-a-night rented hall, the club started…

A WORD OF CAUTION Gentlemen: May I compliment you on giving the “dirt-track’’ folks some very good coverage in your recent issues. Here in Kansas City we graduated to full-modified cars in the price bracket comparable to your “Roadsters With Roofs” with a few meets in 1957 and on a full-time program in 1958. I had the privilege of being the neglected wife whose husband built the 1957 winner of the most A features (although it started in mid-season). The engine was originated by Wayne Colby (in racing form, that is—Mr. Ford was the maker back in 1948) and raced by him in a chassis belonging to Travis Owsley, with Jud Larson driving. Jim Walker and his dad, Charles Walker, bought the chassis and engine, respectively, and raced them most…

Engine swaps, bad news to the unwary a few years ago, have become commonplace enough that one no longer takes for granted the fact that a Chevrolet will have a Chev engine, a Ford be powered by a Ford, or a Plymouth house a Plymouth mill. Hot Rod Magazine, in line with its readers’ painfully ac-quired sophistication in this respect, has contained fewer and fewer articles pertaining to engine swaps in recent years. This, has not been due to lack of popularity in behalf of this particular phase of rodding, but because of our previous coverage on the most popular combinations as they first came into vogue. Now the only notable thing about having an engine other than the one the manufacturer provided in a car is either the neatness…

What constitutes a compact car? It’s a good question, one that will probably get you an argument in any garage in the country. Apparently it was just as tough a nut to Reg Simth. Race Secretary at Sebring when it was decided to run a so-called compact car race in conjunction with the Grand Prix of the United States. Is the term “compact” dependent on engine size, exterior dimensions, price (economy cars is another term) or wheelbase? Obviously Smith and Race Chairman Alec Ulmann decided that the prime consideration was one of wheelbase and. sort of. price. Compact, said they in effect, was anything under no inches and costing less than $5,000 which may or may not represent some sort of economy. The result was the sight of a pair…

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With this issue HRM begins a new WW series—the HR Kart Test. The reason for the series is a simple one. The fantastic growth of the sport of karting and kart rodding has brought with it an equally fantastic number of commercially available karts. The result is such a confusing number of makes and models that the newcomer or even the experienced kart enthusiast has no way of knowing where to turn for either his first or. perhaps, his next kart. It is safe to say that there is no such animal as the “perfect” kart. Each has its advantages and each has certain disadvantages. Further variances are brought about by such factors as driver weight, driver position, tires, engine type, number, size and power and. finally, the type of…

The 1960 Fords are the cars you’ve always hoped would happen. They ride like the Thunderbird, corner like the Thunderbird, move like the Thunderbird—at low Ford prices. This is possible because each Ford has a new Wide-Tread Design that provides a 5-foot tread like the Thunderbird. They have new rear suspension with special leaf springs that are a full 5-feet long. And they have new anti-dive and anti-squat control. With this levelized suspension, bumps are damped out before they reach you. You enjoy a luxuriously comfortable ride … a new sports-car kind of handling on any road. For power, you can have one of the Thunderbird’s own great engines in any 1960 Ford you choose. The Thunderbird 292 V-8 and 352 V-8, like the famous Mileage Maker Six, give superior…

SAYS TOM McCAHILL of MECHANIX ILLUSTRATED. One of America’s best known automotive experts goes “flat out” in his praise for the Solid ’60 Plymouth. Tom McCahill took a Fury 4-door hardtop equipped with the 361-cubic-inch, optional Golden Commando V-8 engine, and really put her through her paces. According to “Uncle Tom,” the Commando power plant. can whizz out 0-60 mph in 8.2 seconds.” As this expert discovered, “The big payoff on a Plymouth comes when you put it on the road.” But don’t take his or anybody’s word for it— you put a Plymouth on the road. Get her out on the roughest, toughest terrain you know. See if you share Tom McCahill’s and our belief that the Solid Plymouth 1960 with new Dura-Quiet Unibody “… is the performance king…

Nassau Speedweek has always been a strange breed of event, a subtropical mixture of mink-dipped-in-motor-oil and pure, out-and-out, round the clock racing on a professional level. Not merely the kicks and cups racing set but the world’s finest cars and best drivers, hardened pros and experienced amateurs— the likes of America’s Jim Rathmann, England’s Stirling Moss, Australia’s Jack Brabham—are drawn to the meet. To the sixth annual edition of this event, just prior to Christmas last, bumptious promoter Red Crise stirred-in a third ingredient—karts. To ears used to, and expecting, the combination of bongo drums and the booming of big bore sports car exhausts the almost unbelievable buzzing shriek of more than 100 karts of every description and from almost every point in the United States came as an eardrum…

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Just supposing there was a place where you could get away with it—don’t you think it would be a ball to rent some clocks and go out early some morning to time your rod and the rods of half a dozen or so of your closest friends? What would you think if a private, modestly undertaken meeting for ten interested parties attracted an attendance of twenty-five without publicity of any sort? Wouldn’t you think it perfectly natural, in the face of this unexpected interest, to go ahead and get the clocks, but to hold a bona fide drag race? How could you react other than enthusiastically when your field of contestants for this event grew from your original estimate of ten, to over forty— and they brought fifteen hundred spectators…